“Please don’t worry,” said Bluebell. “I’m sure we’ll find them – especially since the dresses give off sparkles everywhere they go.”
“You’re right,” Rosa nodded. “Let’s start by asking the dream fairies if they know where our things are.”
The four friends rushed out of their dressing room and flew down the stone steps of the dream fairies’ cave. They bumped into Snowdrop at the bottom, carrying a stack of cake boxes balanced under her chin.
“Snowdrop, have you seen our belongings?” Violet asked her breathlessly. “They’ve all disappeared!”
Snowdrop frowned, her green eyes turning serious. “They’re not in your room?” she asked. “I thought Frederick had delivered everything there.”
Buttercup shook her head. “Our boxes and bags were all empty,” she explained. “But we’re really sorry to bother you – I’m sure you’ve got lots to do without worrying about us. They must be around here somewhere.”
“Yes, please don’t worry,” added Rosa as Snowdrop’s frown grew deeper. “But if it’s OK with you, we’d like to search Dream Mountain to try and find them.”
“Of course,” said Snowdrop. “Please go ahead. Perhaps check the carriage park as well as inside the cave? Maybe they got left behind there. It’s around the other side of the mountain – go out of the main entrance and follow the path to the right. And I’ll ask the other dream fairies in case anyone else has seen them.”
“Thanks, Snowdrop,” said Bluebell, “that’s a really good idea. Violet, Buttercup, perhaps you could have a look in the carriage park, and Rosa and I will search inside?” She fluttered her wings nervously, desperate to track down their outfits and put an end to their panic. This wasn’t how their first Summer Ball was meant to be!
“Of course!” said Violet, taking Buttercup’s hand and flying out of the cave door. “Sorry!” she called as she bumped past guests trying to get into the ball. “But this is a fashion emergency!” At that moment, Bluebell was secretly pleased that Violet could sometimes be quite pushy!
“Good luck!” Rosa called after them.
Bluebell and Rosa quickly began to flutter up one of the sets of stone steps in the huge hallway, both of them keeping their eyes peeled for any sign of their clothes.
“What’s that?” Bluebell pointed to an elf who had emerged from a door right at the top of the same staircase. In his hand were bundles of fabric in different colours. Could it be their dresses?
Rosa squinted in the candlelight. “I’m not sure it’s our things. I can’t see any sparkles,” she said. “And why would that elf have them?”
But Bluebell had already zoomed up towards the little elf, her pale blue wings fluttering so hard they were a blur. “Stop! Wait!” she called after him.
By the time Rosa had caught up with Bluebell, the elf was shaking his head and turning into the next doorway along.
“It wasn’t our outfits,” said Bluebell in a small, disappointed voice. “Just some satin bed linen he was putting out for guests. Sorry.”
“Don’t worry,” said Rosa. “There are still plenty of places to search.” She turned around and pointed across the other side of the cave. “How about that corridor there – it looks like lots more dressing rooms.”
“Good plan,” said Bluebell, and she took the lead, skimming just below the beautiful gleaming stalactites as she flew across the cave hall.
As the two friends landed on the glossy staircase opposite, three smiling fairies zoomed out of one of the doorways nearby. But when they saw the fairy princesses’ faces, they stopped abruptly and their grins vanished.
“Are you OK?” asked one of the fairies, who was dressed in a peach ball gown trimmed with tiny amber gems.
“Not really,” admitted Bluebell. “We want to get ready for the ball, but all our outfits have gone missing. They’re halter-neck ball gowns in pink, yellow, purple and blue. I don’t suppose you’ve seen them?”
The three fairies shook their heads. “I’m really sorry,” said one with short black glossy hair clipped at the side with a bright red rose. “But you could try the other rooms up here. We’ll keep a look out for them too,” she offered.
“Thanks,” Rosa replied. “That would be great.”
The two fairy princesses continued along the corridor, asking every fairy they met whether they’d seen any of their belongings. But no one had, and Bluebell and Rosa were running out of rooms to check and fairies to ask. What’s more, it was much quieter now – most of the fairies had finished getting ready and had left for the ballroom.
Bluebell felt sick with worry. “If we don’t find our outfits soon,” she said, slumping down on the stone staircase, “we’re going to have to miss the ball!”
Rosa put an arm around her fairy friend. “Come on, we can’t give up yet. Anyway, perhaps Violet and Buttercup have found the outfits in the carriage park.”
Bluebell felt a glimmer of hope. “Shall we go and find them?” she suggested.
Rosa nodded. “I think we’ve searched as much as we can in here.”
The two fairy princesses flew down one of the staircases, passing the kitchens on their way. Bluebell glanced in – it was full of elves and fairies stirring and cutting and baking. The smells wafting out of the doorway were delicious – fruity and sweet, savoury and spicy. Bluebell hated the thought that they might miss out on all these tasty delights!
Bluebell and Rosa made it back to the entrance, where hundreds of fairies were flying through the doors. Most of these later arrivals were already dressed in their ball outfits, and they all looked stunning. Bluebell spotted a fairy wearing a particularly gorgeous turquoise dress with a train held up by dragonflies. The outfit looked like it would be so much fun to dance in! Another fairy was wearing an ice-white lace dress with a long scalloped hem. Over her head was a delicate white veil spun from cobwebs, and her necklace had the biggest pearls Bluebell had ever seen. They must have come from Glitter Ocean, thought Bluebell, but there was no time to stop and ask.
“Look, there’s Buttercup and Violet,” said Rosa, pointing to the other side of the large cave doorway.
Bluebell’s heart fluttered with hope as she spotted Buttercup’s silky blonde hair. Have they found our precious outfits? she wondered.
But as they flew over to join them, she saw their hands were empty.
Violet and Buttercup were shaking their heads. “We’re sorry,” said Buttercup, “we looked EVERYWHERE in the carriage park, but we couldn’t find any of our missing things.”
“We didn’t just search inside our carriage, we looked underneath it too!” added Violet as she brushed off dirt and dust from her purple denim jeans.
“We lifted the cushions, and even looked under the seats – I thought that maybe our things had somehow been squeezed into the little gaps there,” Buttercup explained. “But there was nothing – not even any sparkles to give us a clue.”
“How about you?” asked Violet. “Did you find anything inside the cave?”
Rosa shook her head sadly. “Nothing – and the cave’s becoming so crowded that it’s getting harder and harder to look.”
“You’re right – it looks like almost everyone has arrived,” said Buttercup, her blue eyes wide with worry. “The Summer Ball must be starting very soon!”
“I think we’re going to have to go home,” said Bluebell. She had a lump in her throat as she tried really hard not to cry.
The fashion fairy princesses looked distraught. They were so disappointed to be missing the ball.
“Let’s go back to our dressing room to collect our things,” said Rosa. “We’ll just get more miserable if we stand about here.”
They fluttered sadly up the stone steps of the cave, passing fairies in ball gowns coming the other way. They tried to smile bravely at the excited fairies who were on their way to the ballroom.
“Wait, what’s that?” Bluebell’s eye had been caught by something flickering out of one of the dressing-room windows just a little way up. She was sure it was sparkles! Could it be the trail of their dresses? The fairy princess rushed into the room, her pale blue wings fluttering. She peered out of the small triangular window cut into the cave wall. The window didn’t let in much light, as it looked out over the misty landscape of Dream Mountain. But there – she was certain she could see glints of sparkle through the magical fog!
All four fairy princesses were at the window now, staring hard at the bumpy, grass-covered mountainside.
“Come on!” shouted Violet, already flying back to the door of the dressing room, her hands up in the air. “What are you waiting for?”
Moments later, the fairy princesses were fluttering nervously up the steep and misty mountainside – all except Violet, who whizzed ahead. She doesn’t seem at all worried about exploring, thought Bluebell. But she was a bit concerned about the foggy mountain – it looked like it’d be easy to get lost out here. She turned to Buttercup and Rosa. Their faces showed how she felt – tight with concern, lips pursed together and eyes wide.
The fairy princesses could see the sparkles up ahead, twinkling in the mist between two large, moss-covered rocks.
“It’s a cave entrance!” Violet said, zooming quickly inside.
“Do you really think we should go in there?” Rosa called quietly to Violet, but the purple-winged fairy had already disappeared.
Bluebell peered into the opening in the mountainside – Violet was right, it was another cave, with beautiful stalactites hanging from the top and crystal fossils set into the sides. It didn’t look especially scary, but they didn’t know Dream Mountain at all, and Bluebell wasn’t sure that they should be going deeper into the mountain.
Even Buttercup, who loved nature, hesitated. “I’m sure it’s fine,” she said, but her voice didn’t sound very confident.
“Hey, hey!” came a noise which seemed to echo in the cave. Where was it coming from?
Bluebell spun round, her heart racing. What was it? She couldn’t see anything through the mist that surrounded the mountain.
Then two figures began to take shape. “It’s OK!” one of them called. “It’s only us – the dream fairies. We’ve come to help you.”
Bluebell almost collapsed with relief.
“We saw you climbing up here when we were directing carriages to the carriage park,” said the dream fairy on the left, who wore a dark green full-length sari with a beautiful neckline decorated with tiny glass beads.
“We were about to go inside to the ball,” explained the other dream fairy, who had auburn hair and wore a gorgeous satin dress. “But we knew something must be wrong when we spotted you. Can we help?”
Bluebell gave them as big a smile as she could muster. “We’re looking for our lost outfits,” she explained. “We saw sparkles leading into the cave, so we think they might be here.”
By now, Violet had flown back to the others. “What’s happening?” she panted, out of breath, and then she spotted the dream fairies. “Oh, thank fairyland you’re here – you’ll help us, won’t you? We don’t know our way around the caves but we really need to find our dresses!”
Bluebell hoped Violet’s bluntness hadn’t offended the dream fairies, but they only smiled.
“Of course – we were just saying so,” said the auburn-haired one. “I’m Iris, by the way.”
“And I’m Jasmine,” said the fairy in green.
“Our outfits are very special,” explained Rosa, “and give off sparkles everywhere they go. We thought that’d make it easy for us to track them down – but we’ve only spotted seen this clue, and we’ve been searching all day!”
Iris put an arm around Rosa. “Please don’t worry – if they’re somewhere on the mountain, then we promise we’ll find them.”
“And it isn’t as scary as it looks,” said Jasmine. “Follow us, we’ll show you.”
With Iris and Jasmine guiding the way through the cavernous tunnels, the fairy princesses felt much less frightened. They ducked and leapt, fluttered and swirled. The further into the mountain they went the colder it became, and Bluebell rubbed her arms to keep warm as she fluttered her blue wings behind Iris. The sparkles were in sight now – four distinct trails of yellow, pink, purple and blue. They must be from our outfits! thought Bluebell.
Jasmine was beckoning them all on from the front of the group. “If you’re careful not to disturb anything in the mountain,” she whispered, “then the mountain will be kind to you in return.”
Now that Bluebell’s eyes were adjusting to the darkness, she saw how beautiful her surroundings were. The cave’s fossil-covered walls glistened, and brightly coloured moss sprang up from the rocky floor, like a blanket for the ground. She saw pretty purple dragonflies darting above her, and bright blue fireflies dancing down on webs from the stalactites.
“It’s incredible, isn’t it?” Buttercup mouthed to Bluebell as they fluttered past a deep blue pool filled with little green fish. Bluebell turned to look at the water, just for a second, and almost flew into Rosa, who had come to an abrupt halt behind the dream fairies.
“The sparkles!” whispered Rosa. “They’ve gone!”
Bluebell had been so distracted by the beauty of the cave that she hadn’t noticed straight away, but, sure enough, the multicoloured sparkles they’d been following had disappeared. Iris and Jasmine were still zooming in and out of the cave tunnels, trying to find the trail again. But it was nowhere to be seen, and the fairy princesses shook their heads silently, as if to give up.
Bluebell’s heart sank into her shoes. That was it, then – they’d never find their outfits now. They’d have to go home, and miss their first ever Summer Ball. She let herself drift slowly to the ground, but as she landed she stumbled backwards, tripping over a group of silver stalagmites that grew up from the cave floor behind her.
“Are you OK?” asked Buttercup, fluttering down, her hand outstretched to help her friend up.
But Bluebell didn’t reply, because from the floor she could see what they’d all missed before now. Not just the sparkles, but their entire outfits, nestled on a ledge at the very top of the cave!
“There they are!” Violet shouted as she followed Bluebell’s gaze. But Jasmine was shaking her head while pulling Violet away from the ledge.
“Stay quiet,” Iris hissed. “Your clothes aren’t just stuck there – it looks like they’re being used as a nest!”
Sure enough, when they looked closely, the fairy princesses could make out a few tiny beaks poking out of the sparkling fabrics.
“They’re golden dream eagles,” Jasmine said softly. “Of course – they love anything that glitters. The mother eagle must have seen the trail of sparkles from your dresses when your carriage arrived.”
“The golden dream eagle is a very rare bird that lives in Dream Mountain,” Iris explained. “Its feathers are made of gold and they contain special magic that prevents bad dreams.”
“Wow,” murmured Buttercup, her eyes alight with wonder. “They’re beautiful.”
Bluebell could see the mother eagle now, her wings shimmering with a bright golden sheen. The majestic bird was hovering at the edge of the nest, delicately feeding her young as they reached up to her beak.
“Should I fly up to the ledge and try to ease our things out of the nest?” suggested Violet.
Bluebell sucked in a breath – it was just like Violet to offer to do something so daring!
Iris shook her head. “No, we can’t do that,” she said. “The golden dream eagle and her chicks should never be disturbed. If they want to communicate, it is up to them to approach us.”
Jasmine’s face was creased with concern. “Because of the magic they carry, we have to be very careful around them. We really should leave them in peace in the cave
.”
“But without our clothes, we can’t go to the ball!” said Violet. She turned round, away from the other fairies. Bluebell could tell that her friend was very upset, but she didn’t go after her – she know Violet preferred to be left alone when she was feeling down.
“At least we found out what happened to our outfits,” said Bluebell quietly. “And it’s not as if the eagle meant any harm. She didn’t know what she was taking.”
All six fairies flew slowly back through the vast tunnels, away from the nest of the golden dream eagle. Bluebell now felt more confident in navigating the dark cave, but she felt sick with disappointment that they wouldn’t be going to the ball. Everyone was very quiet – even Violet.
Bluebell rubbed her eyes as she flew out of the cave entrance, suddenly exhausted after such an eventful day. Then she rubbed them again, and blinked. She could see a narrow trail of golden mist, quite different from the white mist that surrounded the mountain.
“Iris, Jasmine,” Bluebell called gently but urgently. The dream fairies at the front of the pack spun round. “Have you seen this before?” The fairy princess pointed up towards the mountain summit – there was definitely a trail of something up there, and it seemed to be getting closer!
The dream fairies both looked up, their eyes wide. “No, that’s very strange indeed – and the trail seems to be coming from higher up the mountain,” said Iris.
“Should we follow it?” asked Rosa.
“Please?” added Violet. “I know it’s not our outfits, but it could be important.”
By now, the trail had got so close, Bluebell could almost reach out and touch the golden mist. Where – or who – was it coming from?
“I think you’re right, Violet,” said Bluebell, and then she turned to the dream fairies. “Iris, Jasmine, we don’t want you to miss out on the ball too – we’ll be fine on our own, I promise.”
Bluebell in Dream Mountain Page 2